Genius of Heart and Home
by Lady Lochinvar
Summary: Don and Alan share new insight into what makes Charlie, Charlie


Rated: PG for some language I guess

Disclaimer: I don't own the Eppes family, the Eppes family home, Numb3rs, or Larry Fleinhardt. I only like to play with them sometimes. This is my first foray into Numb3rs FF to be published and the first time to try to post a story on Hope it isn't too sappy or boring. Just a wee drop of whimsy, lovingly tippled out.

Genius of Heart and Home

From the pages of Lady Lochinivar

Don relaxed in his da – no, actually, his brother's back yard, sipping his beer and watching the new lights shimmering down the light rope and reflecting back up in a dancing series of twinkles from the surface of the koi pond. Charlie's latest addition to their home was becoming a hit with his older brother. It was absolutely mesmerizing, relaxing and uplifting in a way this practical FBI agent would never have anticipated, or, thought of.

'Ah,' Amused at the permutations of his own mind, Don found he could not just hear, but, see Professor Larry Fleinhardt explaining enthusiastically with hand gesticulations for further dramatic edification, 'but Charles fully anticipated not only the effect but the astronomically multiplied effect of not only the lights, but the further magnification of patterns that would ensue from the reflection of said lights and patterns off the water surface. Those effects turned even further into ever more unpredictable patterns and eddies by the koi occasionally breaking the surface tension of the water with their rising and flipping their tails as they enjoy their watery domain, creating an exponentially increasing series of ripples, eddies and flows…truly mesmerizing,…fascinating…and, oh so, Charlesian!'

Don chuckled, as he drew another long drag from his beer bottle.

"What has you so very amused, my boy?" Alan asked, looking up from his own enjoyment of the pretty lights Charlie had recently added to the backyard.

Don shook his head, glad the dark hid him blushing. "I just had a mental image of Larry explaining why Charlie decided to add these lights." After barely a pause he went on.

"Hey, do you remember the Dancing Water's light show at Sea World when we went down there when Charlie and I were just little kids?"

The older Eppes shot his son a quizzical look. "I do indeed, but what brings that up, all of a sudden?"

Gesturing around, Don shrugged, as he continued. "Charlie just loved it. Remember? Well, with the music coming out of the new speakers that Chuck put out here and all this light dancing and reflecting around, we could sell tickets to our own backyard light show."

Alan smiled affectionately. "I had almost forgotten how much he loved that. So, is this your way of saying all this is a return to his childhood?"

"What childhood?" Don asked soberly. "Charlie loved the show, yeah, but he also took notes, so he could write an equation to quantify the order of the patterns when he got back to the motel." Don shook his head, sadly. "Charlie never got to just enjoy being a kid, to just see the magic and go – 'Wow…cool.' He was always breaking everything down and analyzing it!"

Not liking the glumness emanating momentarily from his son, Alan pursed his lips and thought carefully a moment before responding. "Yeah. I used to feel that way, too. Thought it seemed very sad." He rapped his son's knee lightly with his knuckles as he added, in a happier tone. "Until one day, your mother wisely pointed out to me that that WAS Charlie's way of hearing the music, seeing the water, watching the lights and going 'Wow…cool'." The eldest Eppes male paused a moment longer, before he continued to put his thoughts into words, slower now. "This just hit me. It may be this lovely merlot talking, but remember, Donnie, no one was forcing him to go write those equations. Most of us, we see a fireworks show or a magic act or the Eppes Lights and we may love it, we may enjoy it immensely, but, after we walk away, the memory fades. Can you remember the Dancing Waters precisely, Don or is it just a faded, warm, fuzzy, but fond memory?

"For Charlie, in one of the notebooks he has piled high in the attic or the garage or his room, there are equations written down. If he were to run through those equations, I bet you, he could recreate in his mind, exactly, not only the colors, the patterns and the way the waters leapt, but how he felt at the moment. It is art really, captured in an equation, captured for all of his life."

Don looked at his father for a long moment. "Wow. I never thought of it like that. That's either very deep, or, what Larry would call practically cosmic thinking, Dad."

Alan chuckled. "I'll leave cosmic to the likes of the good Professor Fleinhardt. This is more that I am finally beginning to catch up to where your mother was years ago…beginning to get a little insight and understanding into what makes our Charlie tick."

Don raised his beer in salute. "Here's to that!" After another long sip, he said. "Don't take this the wrong way, Pop…but I'm really glad Charlie bought the house when you decided to sell. At first, I wasn't sure how I felt, but there is really something to be said for 'keeping it in the family'. It's still…"

"HOME?" His father verbally nudged him to continue sharing when the pause stretched on too long.

"Yeah; it still is OUR HOME. I mean, sure…it belongs to Charlie now and he's made some changes, but mostly they've actually…"

Alan smiled and nodded his acknowledgment. "The changes have actually enhanced the degree to which it is not just HOME, but Eppes' Central?"

Don laughed at the last part. "Eppes Central?"

Alan's smile grew a bit wistful. "Yes, Don. Haven't you noticed how he has gone out of his way to make sure that not just you and I, but your team and friends, his friends, Art, the book club, my friends…all of us…we gravitate here? It's welcoming us all in."

"Oh, damn…you're right. This place has become a magnet for all of us. I mean, not that it wasn't always a welcoming place. You have always been great about things like that and so was Mom, but…Wow." Don was quiet for a long moment, thinking about the way poker nights, barbeques, birthdays and celebrations for not just the family but his work friends and so many others had become looked forward to occasions for all involved.

Alan was speaking, again. "I thought I was doing the right thing. I thought your mother had pushed me to date. Now, it was time for me to push Charlie to move out, spread his wings and fly away from the nest…." Alan wasn't sure this was coming out right, but he was talking as the thought congealed in his mind. "I am not sorry I put the house up for sale…nor that I sold it; but, but I am so glad, Donnie….so very glad, that Charlie knew what he wanted, took action and BOUGHT IT. You may think I am overstating this, but I think he KNEW instinctively that we all needed…"

"For this house to still be our HOME?" Don picked at his beer bottle's label.

Alan wiped a bit of moisture from his eyes. "I know we would have been all right…or I think I do. We would have met for dinner, gotten together, but we would have lost something precious, I think. I know it's just a building…"

"No, Dad. It is so much more than that! Don't minimize Charlie's insight. I bet you thought just like I did, at first, that Charlie just didn't want change when he bought the house. I think now it was always more than that." He looked at his father rather urgently. "Wasn't it? This place has history for us all and buying it and keeping it in the family allowed us all to maintain that…that…continuity. It did more than that though; it expanded the history and those who share in it." Don grinned and held up his now empty beer. "Way to go, little bro!"

Alan tried to sound curmudgeonly. "Clever little so and so, isn't he?"

"Gee, Pop, haven't you heard? Kid is a friggin' genius?" The grin just wouldn't leave Don's face.

"I guess I just never realized his true genius was genius of the heart, and his is a heart that knows its home." Alan mused, agreeing, but adding to the observation. He pulled another beer out of the small cooler next to his chair, twisted the lid off and handed it to his eldest son.

Don immediately raised the fresh beer, offering a toast. "To genius, to hearts, and to Home."

As Alan clinked glass to beer bottle and took a celebratory sip, both men felt a sudden, light breeze that caressed their faces before it danced across the koi pond and jiggled the light strand, as a soft hint of lavender briefly scented the air. Alan glanced over at Don and saw his head cocked to one side, his eyes closed and a single tear run down his cheek. Alan Eppes inhaled the fading scent and knew they had both been graced with a gentle touch of Margaret's pleasure as the more obtuse males of the family shared, yet another insight into the youngest of the Eppes clan.


End file.
